The following article is based on reports from a Berkeley student.
The huge University of California at Berkeley has been in a ferment since the beginning of the fall term over the issue of free speech, The original cause of the conflict was the introduction by the Administration of regulations which prohibit students from advocating political and social action, from recruiting members and from soliciting funds for offcampus political causes, other then those officially sanctioned by the Administration, One of the consequences of these regulations is the severe hampering of such projects as the Voter Registration drive in the south, because most of the workers for these projects are recruited at universities.
At the beginning of term many students asked without success for the new rules to be rescinded. Then students from sever'‘1 off-campus political groups defied the rules by setting up tables with literature advocating political action. Eight students were then suspended indefinitely. The Administration refused to deal equally with 400 others who signed a statement that they had violated the same rulings. Then, on October end, a graduate was arrested for violating these rules. This provoked a massive non-violent demonstration. Before the arrested graduate was re=moved, thoudands of students ‘sat down' in front of the police car, They held it captive for 32 hours. Some 3,000 of the 27,000 cnrolled students took part and they ranged in political opinion from Young Republicans to members of SNCC, and Marxists.
The Administration refused to recognize that the issue was that of free speech and charged the students with disturbing ‘law and order’, and summoned nearly 1,000 police armed with riot sticks, guns and tear gas. Under the threat of violence the leaders of the students negotiated a settlement. The students are now organised as the Free Speech Movement (FSM) and have got the support of the American Civil Liberties Union. The latter consider that the Administration's action contravenes the guarantees of political rights in the First Amendment of the American Constitution,
The ensuing negotiations broke down in early December, The President of the University presented to the Regents (the governing body who are appointed by the State Governor) a susgestion that would restrict poiitical and social action to "legal activity" only - he also asked for more campus police. The suggestions were accepted in spite of a crowd of 5,000 students who demonstrated outside the hall where the meeting took place, The proposals were designed to eliminate civil disobedience activity. The FSM argued that only the coutts af law could decide what actions were legal, and that the proposals would make the students "second-class citizens" by @priving them of nolitical rights.
The students then decided to test the constitutional position so they continued to advocate picketinz and civil disobedience at the Oakland Tribune (a kind of lovtal Hyde Park). The Deans took the names of such students and threatened to exvel them but were deterred because of the numbers involved - many hundreds. Following this the University brought charges against the leaders of FSM and were obviously trying to get these people into serious trouble. Simultaneously a MacCarthyite Smear campaign was carried out in the lodéal press - notably the San Francisco Examiner - in which the FSli leaders were described as